Laser-accurate existing drawings of your Westminster property — floor plans, elevations and sections measured on site and drawn to millimetre tolerance, so every design, planning application and lease that follows starts from a base that is actually right, delivered in days.
Westminster City Council granted 87% of the householder planning decisions it made in its latest published year — level with the 87% England-wide householder average. Basement excavation is tightly policed on depth, garden coverage and construction impact given the density of listed and stucco stock, which is where a policy-literate drawing pack earns its keep. Its dominant Georgian (1714–1837) and Victorian (1837–1901) housing stock sets the design brief on most streets.
The permitted-development ceilings are fixed: 40m³ of new roof volume for a terraced loft and 50m³ for a semi or detached house under Class B, plus a 3m single-storey rear extension on a terrace or 4m on a detached house under Class A. Westminster carries at least one Article 4 direction, and conservation areas including Bayswater, Maida Vale and Pimlico remove those rights outright, so we confirm your exact address before a line is drawn. A validated householder application in Westminster is determined against an 8-week statutory target.
Bayswater (stucco terraces around leafy garden squares), Maida Vale (red-brick and stucco mansion blocks along wide avenues), Pimlico (Thomas Cubitt's uniform white stucco terraces), Marylebone (Georgian and Victorian terraces mixed with mansion flats), Belgravia (grand stucco terraces served by their own mews) and Queen's Park (the model-cottage streets of the Queen's Park Estate on the Westminster side) — these are the Westminster pockets our drawings cover most. Heritage designations here include Bayswater, Maida Vale, Pimlico, Marylebone and Queen's Park. Westminster City Council weighs each proposal against the Westminster City Plan and the Basements SPD, where mansard and roof extensions are steered by the roof-extension policy to sit within an unbroken terrace profile. Larger stucco houses in Bayswater and Marylebone are widely converted into flats, which carry no householder permitted-development rights.. On roofs the borough is mansard roofs to the stucco terraces and concealed butterfly roofs behind parapets, over stucco-fronted Georgian and Victorian terraces, purpose-built mansion flats and mews houses to the rear of the grand streets.
Every proposed drawing is really two drawings — the house as it is, and the house as it will be — and the second is only as good as the first. A measured survey captures the property as-built: room sizes, wall thicknesses, window and door positions, floor-to-floor heights, ceiling lines and the outside envelope, all cross-checked so the plans, elevations and sections agree. Westminster's stucco-fronted Georgian and Victorian terraces, purpose-built mansion flats and mews houses to the rear of the grand streets are rarely square or standard — walls lean, floors step, bays and returns hide behind later work — so measuring by hand off an old estate-agent plan simply carries the errors forward.
We survey with a laser measure and, on larger or more complex Westminster buildings, a scanner that captures a point cloud — millions of measured points the drawings are traced from — so nothing is estimated. The output is a clean set of scaled as-existing drawings, delivered in CAD, that an architect, engineer or lease-plan draughtsman can work straight into. Basement excavation is tightly policed on depth, garden coverage and construction impact given the density of listed and stucco stock, and an accurate existing set is what lets the proposed scheme answer that without a mid-project surprise.
Period and listed stock — the kind found across Bayswater, Maida Vale, Pimlico, Marylebone and Queen's Park and Westminster's other conservation areas — is exactly where survey accuracy matters most, because heritage detail, irregular geometry and past alterations all have to be recorded faithfully. The overwhelming majority of Westminster lies within a conservation area, and Article 4 directions across districts like Bayswater and Pimlico remove permitted-development rights on facades, roofs and windows. We capture the fabric as it really is so the record stands up to scrutiny.
A measured survey is worth its cost whenever an accurate existing record matters. For Westminster properties that usually means one of these:
We measure the whole property on site — plans, elevations, sections, floor-to-floor heights and the external envelope — and deliver a clean, scaled as-existing CAD set that your architect, engineer or lease draughtsman can build straight onto, so no one is re-measuring halfway through the Westminster project.
Below is Westminster City Council's real householder decision record, drawn from official planning statistics and refreshed as new data lands. Westminster grants a high share of householder applications, though near-total conservation-area coverage and a restrictive basement regime are the constraints behind most refusals. A measured survey never appears in these figures, but it sits behind the applications that do — an accurate existing set is the difference between a scheme that is decided on merit and one queried because the drawings do not add up.
Source: MHCLG planning application statistics (householder decisions, rolling year). Compare every borough on our London approval-rate league table.
Tell us about your project and get a fixed, no-obligation quote back within one working day. If you don't need planning permission at all, we'll tell you that too — for free.
The deliverable is a coordinated set: existing floor plans for every level, elevations of each face, and at least one section cut through the building to show floor-to-floor and ceiling heights — the dimension a plan alone can never carry. Everything is drawn to a stated scale and tolerance and issued as CAD, so it drops straight into the next stage. Across Bayswater, Maida Vale and Pimlico, the buildings that most reward this are the large and altered ones, where a wrong assumption about a wall or a level costs a redesign later.
Mansard and roof extensions are steered by the roof-extension policy to sit within an unbroken terrace profile. We cross-check every dimension on site so the plans, elevations and sections agree with each other and with the real Westminster building — the discipline that stops a proposed extension being drawn against a wall that is not where the old plan said it was.
We survey houses, flats and mixed-use buildings across the borough. A few of the Westminster neighbourhoods where measured surveys come up most often:
Measured surveys of Bayswater's stucco terraces around leafy garden squares — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Maida Vale's red-brick and stucco mansion blocks along wide avenues — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Pimlico's Thomas Cubitt's uniform white stucco terraces — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Marylebone's Georgian and Victorian terraces mixed with mansion flats — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Belgravia's grand stucco terraces served by their own mews — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
Measured surveys of Queen's Park's the model-cottage streets of the Queen's Park Estate on the Westminster side — laser-measured, cross-checked and delivered as scaled as-existing CAD.
A full survey records the property in three dimensions, not one. This is what each output gives and what it is used for.
| Output | What it records | Used for | Typical method |
|---|---|---|---|
| Existing floor plans | Room sizes, wall thicknesses, openings | Design, planning, lease plans | Laser measure |
| Elevations | Each external face, window positions, heights | Planning applications, heritage | Laser & photo |
| Sections | Floor-to-floor and ceiling heights | Loft, structural, headroom checks | Laser & scan |
| Point cloud | Millions of measured points | Complex or large buildings | 3D laser scanner |
On period and listed stock around Bayswater and Maida Vale, a point-cloud survey records irregular Westminster fabric that hand measurement would miss.
A fixed process built around getting the existing record right first time — most as-existing sets are delivered within five days of the site visit.
Tell us the Westminster property type and what the survey is for. We confirm what you need — plans only, or plans, elevations and sections — and whether a scan is worth it for the building's size or complexity.
A surveyor measures the whole property with a laser measure and, where useful, a 3D scanner — every room, the external envelope, floor-to-floor heights and the awkward corners an old plan glosses over.
We draw up the coordinated existing plans, elevations and sections to a stated scale and tolerance and issue them as CAD, ready for the next stage of your Westminster project.
You get the full set in CAD and PDF, and we answer any query from the architect, engineer or Westminster City Council that follows — the survey is the base everything else is checked against.
No — a measured survey is simply an accurate record of the property as it stands, so it needs no permission from Westminster City Council and involves no building work. It is the step before any application: the as-existing drawings it produces become the base for the proposed scheme you later submit. Many Westminster projects go wrong precisely because they skip it and design onto an inaccurate old floorplan instead.
They answer completely different questions. A valuation or condition survey tells you what a Westminster property is worth or what state it is in; a measured building survey tells you precisely what shape and size it is — the dimensions an architect or engineer needs to draw from. If you are extending, converting or applying to Westminster City Council, it is the measured survey you need, not a valuation.
You can, and for a small square room it is fine — but Westminster's stucco-fronted georgian and victorian terraces are rarely square, and small errors compound across a whole building until the plans, elevations and sections no longer agree. A laser or scanned survey cross-checks every dimension so the set is internally consistent. The cost is modest against a redesign, or an application Westminster City Council queries because the drawings do not match the building.
A full measured survey includes all three. Floor plans alone cannot tell you floor-to-floor or ceiling heights, which is exactly what a loft conversion, a structural calculation or a headroom check in a Westminster property depends on. We record elevations of each external face and cut at least one section through the building, so the existing set is complete and every later stage has the dimension it needs. Westminster City Council is the decision-maker.
Yes — an accurate measured survey is the ideal base for both. A Land Registry-compliant lease plan is drawn from the same existing measurements, and a party wall surveyor works from an accurate record of the Westminster property and its boundaries. Commissioning one survey that serves the design, a lease plan and any party wall work avoids paying to measure the building more than once. Westminster City Council is the decision-maker.
We price each Westminster survey on the size of the property and whether you need plans only or plans, elevations and sections, and send a fixed, no-obligation quote within one working day. Larger or listed buildings that warrant a 3D scan are quoted accordingly. The survey pays for itself by keeping every later drawing and Westminster City Council submission accurate. Call 020 7864 7245 to start.
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